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The Project Gutenberg EBook The Caxtons, by Bulwer-Lytton, Part 4 #18 in our series by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
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**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
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Title: The Caxtons, Part 4
Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton
Release Date: February 2005 [EBook #7589] [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first
posted on January 1, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CAXTONS, BY LYTTON, PART 4 ***
This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens and David Widger PART IV. CHAPTER I.
I was always an early riser. Happy the man who is! Every morning, day comes to him with a virgin's love, full ...
Voir
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**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**EBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers*****
Title: The Caxtons, Part 4
Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton
Release Date: February 2005 [EBook #7589] [Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] [This file was first
posted on January 1, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CAXTONS, BY LYTTON, PART 4 ***
This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens and David Widger
I was always an early riser. Happy the man who is! Every morning, day comes to him with a virgin's love, full ...
The Project Gutenberg EBook The Caxtons, byBulwer-Lytton, Part 4 #18 in our series by EdwardBulwer-Lytton
Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Besure to check the copyright laws for your countrybefore downloading or redistributing this or anyother Project Gutenberg eBook.
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**Welcome To The World of Free Plain VanillaElectronic Texts**
**EBooks Readable By Both Humans and ByComputers, Since 1971**
*****These EBooks Were Prepared By Thousandsof Volunteers*****
Title: The Caxtons, Part 4
Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton
Release Date: February 2005 [EBook #7589] [Yes,we are more than one year ahead of schedule][This file was first posted on January 1, 2003]
Edition: 10
Language: English
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERGEBOOK THE CAXTONS, BY LYTTON, PART 4 ***
This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens andDavid Widger <widger@cecomet.net>
PART IV.
CHAPTER I.
I was always an early riser. Happy the man who is!Every morning, day comes to him with a virgin'slove, full of bloom and purity and freshness. Theyouth of Nature is contagious, like the gladness ofa happy child. I doubt if any man can be called"old" so long as he is an early riser and an earlywalker. And oh, youth!—take my word of it— youthin dressing-gown and slippers, dawdling overbreakfast at noon, is a very decrepit, ghastly imageof that youth which sees the sun blush over themountains, and the dews sparkle upon blossominghedgerows.
Passing by my father's study, I was surprised tosee the windows unclosed; surprised more, onlooking in, to see him bending over his books,—forI had never before known him study till after themorning meal. Students are not usually earlyrisers, for students, alas! whatever their age, arerarely young. Yes, the Great Book must be gettingon in serious earnest. It was no longer dalliancewith learning; this was work.
I passed through the gates into the road. A few ofthe cottages were giving signs of returning life, butit was not yet the hour for labor, and no "Goodmorning, sir," greeted me on the road. Suddenly ata turn, which an over-hanging beech-tree hadbefore concealed, I came full upon my UncleRoland.
"What! you, sir? So early? Hark, the clock isstriking five!"
"Not later! I have walked well for a lame man. Itmust be more than four miles to—and back."
"You have been to—? Not on business? No soulwould be up."
"Yes, at inns there is always some one up.Hostlers never sleep! I have been to order myhumble chaise and pair. I leave you today,nephew."
"Ah, uncle, we have offended you! It was my folly,that cursed print—"
"Pooh! said my uncle, quickly. "Offended me,"boy? I defy you!" and he pressed my hand roughly.
"Yet this sudden determination! It was butyesterday, at the RomanCamp, that you planned an excursion with myfather, to C——— Castle."
"Never depend upon a whimsical man. I must be inLondon tonight ".
"And return to-morrow?"
"I know not when," said my uncle, gloomily; and hewas silent for some moments. At length, leaningless lightly on my arm, he continued: "Young man,you have pleased me. I love that open, saucy brow
of yours, on which Nature has written 'Trust me.' Ilove those clear eyes, that look one manfully in theface. I must know more of you—much of you. Youmust come and see me some day or other in yourancestors' ruined keep."
"Come! that I will. And you shall show me the oldtower—"
"And the traces of the outworks!" cried my uncle,flourishing his stick.
"And the pedigree—"
"Ay, and your great-great-grandfather's armor,which he wore at MarstonMoor—"
"Yes, and the brass plate in the church, uncle."
"The deuce is in the boy! Come here, come here:I've three minds to break your head, sir!"
"It is a pity somebody had not broken the rascallyprinter's, before he had the impudence to disgraceus by having a family, uncle."
Captain Roland tried hard to frown, but he couldnot. "Pshaw!" said he, stopping, and taking snuff."The world of the dead is wide; why should theghosts jostle us?"
"We can never escape the ghosts, uncle. Theyhaunt us always. We cannot think or act, but thesoul of some man, who has lived before, points the
way. The dead never die, especially since—"
"Since what, boy? You speak well."
"Since our great ancestor introduced printing," saidI, majestically.
My uncle whistled "Malbrouk s'en va-t-en guerre."
I had not the heart to plague him further.
"Peace!" said I, creeping cautiously within the circleof the stick.
"No! I forewarn you—"
"Peace! and describe to me my little cousin, yourpretty daughter,—for pretty I am sure she is."
"Peace," said my uncle, smiling. "But you mustcome and judge for yourself."
CHAPTER II.
Uncle Roland was gone. Before he went, he wascloseted for an hour with my father, who thenaccompanied him to the gate; and we all crowdedround him as he stepped into his chaise. When theCaptain was gone, I tried to sound my father as tothe cause of so sudden a departure. But my fatherwas impenetrable in all that related to his brother'ssecrets. Whether or not the Captain had everconfided to him the cause of his displeasure withhis son,—a mystery which much haunted me,—myfather was mute on that score both to my motherand myself. For two or three days, however, Mr.Caxton was evidently unsettled. He did not eventake to his Great Work, but walked much alone, oraccompanied only by the duck, and without even abook in his hand. But by degrees the scholarlyhabits returned to him; my mother mended hispens, and the work went on.
For my part, left much to myself, especially in themornings, I began to muse restlessly over thefuture. Ungrateful. that I was, the happiness ofhome ceased to content me. I heard afar the roarof the great world, and roved impatient by theshore.
At length, one evening, my father, with somemodest hums and ha's, and an unaffected blush onhis fair forehead, gratified a prayer frequentlyurged on him, and read me some portions of the
Great Work. I cannot express the feelings thislecture created,—they were something akin toawe. For the design of this book was so immense,and towards its execution a learning so vast andvarious had administered, that it seemed to me asif a spirit had opened to me a new world, which hadalways been before my feet, but which my ownhuman blindness had hitherto concealed from me.The unspeakable patience with which all thesematerials had been collected, year after year; theease with which now, by the calm power of genius,they seemed of themselves to fall into harmonyand system; the unconscious humility with whichthe scholar exposed the stores of a laborious life,—-all combined to rebuke my own restlessnessand ambition, while they filled me with a pride in myfather which saved my wounded egotism from apang. Here, indeed, was one of those books whichembrace an existence; like the Dictionary of Bayle,or the History of Gibbon, or the "Fasti Hellenici" ofClinton, it was a book to which thousands of bookshad contributed, only to make the originality of thesingle mind more bold and clear. Into the furnaceall vessels of gold, of all ages, had been cast; butfrom the mould came the new coin, with its singlestamp. And, happily, the subject of the work did notforbid to the writer the indulgence of his naive,peculiar irony of humor, so quiet, yet so profound.My father's book was the "History of Human Error."It was, therefore, the moral history of mankind, toldwith truth and earnestness, yet with an arch,unmalignant smile. Sometimes, indeed, the smiledrew tears. But in all true humor lies its germ,pathos. Oh! by the goddess Moria, or Folly, but he
was at home in his theme. He viewed man first inthe savage state, preferring in this the positiveaccounts of voyagers and travellers to the vaguemyths of antiquity and the dreams of speculatorson our pristine state. From Australia and Abyssiniahe drew pictures of mortality unadorned, as livelyas if he had lived amongst Bushmen and savagesall his life. Then he crossed over the Atlantic, andbrought before you the American Indian, with hisnoble nature, struggling into the dawn ofcivilization, when Friend Penn cheated him out ofhis birthright, and the Anglo-Saxon drove him backinto darkness. He showed both analogy andcontrast between this specimen of our kind andothers equally apart from the extremes of thesavage state and the cultured,— the Arab in histent, the Teuton in his forests, the Greenlander inhis boat, the Finn in his reindeer car. Up sprangthe rude gods of the North and the resuscitatedDruidism, passing from its earliest templeless beliefinto the later corruptions of crommell and idol. Upsprang, by their side, the Saturn of thePhoenicians, the mystic Budh of India, theelementary deities of the Pelasgian, the Naith andSerapis of Egypt, the Ormuzd of Persia, the Bel ofBabylon, the winged genii of the graceful Etruria.How nature and life shaped the religion; how thereligion shaped the manners; how, and by whatinfluences, some tribes were formed for progress;how others were destined to remain stationary, orbe swallowed up in war and slavery by theirbrethren,—was told with a precision clear andstrong as the voice of Fate. Not only an antiquarianand philologist, but an anatomist and philosopher,
my father brought to bear on all these grave pointsthe various speculations involved in the distinctionof races. He showed how race in perfection isproduced, up to a certain point, by admixture; howall mixed races have been the most intelligent;how, in proportion as local circumstance andreligious faith permitted the early fusion of differenttribes, races improved and quickened into therefinements of civilization. He tracked the progressand dispersion of the Hellenes from their mythicalcradle in Thessaly, and showed how those whosettled near the sea- shores, and were compelledinto commerce and intercourse with strangers,gave to Greece her marvellous accomplishments inarts and letters,—the flowers of the ancient world.How others, like the Spartans; dwelling evermore ina camp, on guard against their neighbors, andrigidly preserving their Dorian purity of extraction,contributed neither artists, nor poets, norphilosophers to the golden treasure-house of mind.He took the old race of the Celts, Cimry, orCimmerians. He compared the Celt who, as inWales, the Scotch Highlands, in Bretagne, and inuncomprehended Ireland, retains his oldcharacteristics and purity of breed, with the Celtwhose blood, mixed by a thousand channels,dictates from Paris the manners and revolutions ofthe world. He compared the Norman, in his ancientScandinavian home, with that wonder ofintelligence and chivalry into which he grew, fusedimperceptibly with the Frank, the Goth, and theAnglo-Saxon. He compared the Saxon, stationaryin the land of Horsa, with the colonist and civilizesof the globe as he becomes when he knows not
